1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicular shock absorbing body, and more particular to a vehicle shock absorbing body which tends to inhibit an excessive load from being generated in a knee or the like at a time when a body member having a small pressure receiving area such as the knee or the like is interfered with an interior member in the case that a shock is applied to a vehicle.
A description will be given below of a vehicular shock absorbing body by exemplifying a case that the vehicle shock absorbing body is assembled in a back surface of a restraint body in a passenger protecting apparatus (a passenger restraint apparatus) which protrudes toward a restraint predetermined position (for example, the knee) of a seated passenger so as to inhibit the restraint predetermined position from moving in collision of the vehicle, however, the structure is not limited to this.
In other words, the vehicular shock absorbing body can be applied to a case that no passenger restraint mechanism is provided, and a vehicular shock absorbing body is simply arranged in a back surface of a vehicle interior member such as a side door, a quarter panel, a front/back seat or the like so as to reduce a shock load and a shock energy.
2. Description of Related Art
In conventional, as this kind of passenger restraint apparatus, there has been a structure in which a knee restraint body (a restraint panel) such as a knee bolster, a knee panel or the like connected to a drive mechanism is arranged so as to face the knee of the seated passenger in such a manner that a front face of the knee restraint body forms a part of the interior member (for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 4-278858 and 2001-122061).
At this time, in the case that the knee restraint panel is interfered with the knee, it is desirable to arrange the shock absorbing body in the back surface of the knee restraint panel in view of reducing the shock load and/or the shock energy received by the knee.
There can be considered that the shock absorbing body employs a vehicular shock absorbing structure (a vehicular shock absorbing body) having a synthetic resin rib structure (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 8-142234 and 8-91160). Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 8-142234 describes a structure in which thin ribs having a predetermined height are provided in a rising grid-like manner on one surface of a support plate portion (a top plate), and the patent document 4 describes a structure in which a part of the ribs or all of the ribs are formed such that at least an upper portion of the rib is gradually narrowed toward an upper end in the structure described in the patent document 3.